


Not Quite Dead Enough

by LyraNgalia



Series: The Montenegrin Affair [2]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Future Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-07
Updated: 2012-12-07
Packaged: 2017-11-20 12:43:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/585548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LyraNgalia/pseuds/LyraNgalia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mycroft Holmes discovers that the dead can still provide a few surprises when Irene Adler appears in 221B Baker Street. Takes place before <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/579928">Assault on a Brownstone</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not Quite Dead Enough

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [thestarkinthetardis](http://thestarkinthetardis.tumblr.com/) over on Tumblr, who wanted to see what would happen when Mycroft or John found out about Sherlock and Irene.

After Montenegro, after his death and subsequent resurrection, Irene Adler rarely visited 221B Baker Street. Their occasional liaisons, the games they played, skipped around the world: St. Petersburg, Phuket, Rio de Janeiro, Cairo. But she stayed away from London, away from Belgravia and Baker Street.

Except once, more than two years after Sherlock Holmes' triumphant return from the dead. A particularly spectacular bit of scandal had forced the ghost known as Irene Adler into hiding, into obscuring her trail, and so she packed up and headed to the safest place she knew: the familiar, overstuffed flat in London.

*****

The flat had been empty when she'd slipped in with a young boy, no more than 18 months old, on her hip. John Watson had gone out for milk, and Sherlock Holmes was on a case. The housekeeper was enthralled with some daytime talk show on the telly, and utterly failed to notice woman and child as they made their way up the back of Baker Street.

Once in the flat, Irene took care to open a window, a particularly hard to reach one on the far exterior wall, but one still big enough for woman and child to fit. The boy was then deposited on the floor to amuse himself with a skull from the mantlepiece, and Irene curled up in Sherlock's chair to wait, his riding crop across her knee and a battered copy of The Maltese Falcon in hand.

*****

The footsteps that came up the front weren't those of either John Watson or Sherlock Holmes, and for a moment Irene considered slipping away, until she heard the tap of metal against wood, the counterpoint of an umbrella against the stairs. She arched an eyebrow at the doorway and turned back to her novel. She had come to Baker Street despite knowing that her presence would give lie to the deception that she had died in Karachi, though she had not expected the first person who'd discover it to be Mycroft Holmes.

“Sherlock, a matter of--” Whatever the matter was, Irene did not find out, as Mycroft Holmes crossed the threshold of the flat and saw her sitting in the chair. A smile, sharp and knowing and deeply amused, tugged at her lips as she set the book aside. His gaze swept over her, twice, as if to ensure that she was in fact exactly who she appeared. Irene wondered idly what sign he sought, what the sweeping glance was supposed to tell him. 

“Hello, Mr. Holmes.”

“Miss Adler,” he answered in an impressively calm voice, with nothing more than a patient arched eyebrow. That was, until he saw the boy, with his mop of dark, curly hair and pale eyes that were currently staring intensely at the skull as his fingers prodded its eye sockets. Then, his eyes widened, ever so slightly, staring at the boy. Irene imagined he was working through the resemblance, the possibilities. She counted the seconds in her head. “Your son, I presume?”

She nodded. “Fifty-two seconds, I'm impressed.”

The boy looked up, at the sound of his mother's voice, and stared solemnly at Mycroft. Twenty-four more seconds ticked by, as the elder Holmes stared back at the boy. Eventually, Mycroft Holmes set his umbrella aside and knelt to offer his hand to the boy, who grabbed a finger.

“Hello, nephew.”

The boy smiled, showing a few small white teeth, and promptly bit him.


End file.
